Rainy Season
by Levii
Summary: Looking for family fun? Happily ever after? Whee! Don't look here. Why mutants might want to practice safe sex. Actions/Consequences. Rather dark.


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Rainy Season

It wasn't all together planned, to be honest.

I was stroking the small of her back as she sat by the window, curled up among the pillows, watching the rain. She said she liked the rain, the smell, the sound, the patterns it ran down the windows, but I knew her too well to believe that. I knew something was bothering her.

I didn't pry. I didn't have to. I can remember it so clearly, the way her hair gently brushed my arm when she turned to face me, and that look she had – sweet, and pained, and calm, all at the same time. I held her hand.

"I'm pregnant," she said, "I thought you should be the first to know."

It all seems so cliché now, looking back. If we were normal teenagers, perhaps it would have been different. But we weren't. 

Her news…it didn't bother me, at all, and I was a little surprised. I found commitment no longer scared me – I was an adult by society's standards, and it felt right somehow to act the part too, and gather her up in my arms, and just hold her there. I kissed her forehead.

"I'm sorry," she said, like it was her fault, like there was a deep rooted regret somewhere in her mind.

"I'm not," I told her, and hugged her fiercely, like it might be the last time. She didn't say anything, just crumpled against my body like a tired child. Words spilled out of my mouth, "I'm not afraid to commit…I mean, if you're not. I wouldn't mind…spending the rest of my life with you. No, I wouldn't mind at all…"

She let out a choked laugh that sounded oddly waterlogged.

"I wouldn't mind either."

And that was it. In a rather childish way, we had taken vows. I was so sure things were going to be okay. Once the idea of becoming a father sank it, I begin to like it a little. I had grown up without a family, and the prospect of creating my own was suddenly rather…nice. Almost appealing. Warm reassurance seeped into both of us like a somniferous drug, and we slept the night by the window, with the rain coming down. The next day's weather report said it had rained all night.

--

We told everyone who deserved to know. We'd decided it wasn't worth keeping secret.

We weren't condemned, and agreed the wedding could wait. No one seemed particularly surprised by the news, and most of our friends were supportive. She told me she wrote her family a letter, but that she hadn't gotten a response.

Then hurriedly added, before I had a chance to feel guilty, that it didn't matter that much to her.

She told me I was her family now, our friends were her family. I knew she wanted to believe it, but I should have known not to believe it myself.

My best friend was among the most supportive. He had to be open minded, considering. He asked if he could be a godparent, or an uncle figure, and if he could spoil the kid rotten and teach him all his tricks.

I laughed at that, then I agreed. She agreed too, but pointed out later that, you never know, it could be a girl. It was the first sign that she was really accepting the whole thing, and I kissed her like it was the first time.

I knew that accepting pregnancy was hard for her. I'd catch that distracted look in her eyes as she ran her fingers and nails over her stomach, or saw women pushing strollers on the sidewalk. Twice I'd caught her pausing in front of a mirror, and carefully examining her body's profile: shirt hiked up and hands – starting right below her breasts and stopping at her hips – running over her skin.

I thought it was acceptance, or maybe intrigue, but that was before I found that little slip of paper on her dresser, near the phone.

It was only a phone number, scrawled down in red ink, but nothing could have jarred me more. I was suddenly confused. My heart caught in my throat and hung there like a heavy pendulum. And when I sat down on the bed, I found I couldn't stand up again.

She came in later, and found me like that. She saw me holding that paper, and immediately needed the door frame for support.

"Hey…" she said, "It's not…"

"Why?" That was all I wanted to know, that was all I ever wanted to know. The how, the where; it didn't matter, "Why?"

She took the paper away from me and put it back on the dresser. She hugged me, rapidly explaining, that she'd taken the number down when she first found out she was pregnant, but never gave it a second thought. She said she had no desire to contact the clinic – call or otherwise, but that she had a friend's address written on the back that she needed to transfer over. 

There had been something on the back, written in pencil, but I hadn't given _that_ any notice – as _it _wasn't the number of an abortion clinic.

"I thought you were happy," I said.

"I am. Now," she assured me, and wrapped her arms around my shoulders again. Then taking my hand and laying it on her stomach; "Have you been thinking about any names? I was thinking, maybe Audrey if it's a girl."

"That's a nice name," I told her. It meant golden, something I'd remembered from flipping through the baby name books we were so embarrassed to purchase.

"Or Jonathon for a boy. I think it means…gift."

That was the second night we spent together by the window, while the rain came down.

And life went on. And the number stayed on her dresser. I never touched it again.

--

One morning I slept in too late. Not something I usually do, but it happens to everyone, I suppose. She was gone, but it was almost noon, so it I wasn't worried. She'd turned out to be an early bird, perhaps a more chronic one than I, and she liked to go out in the morning.

She admitted the whole concept of "morning sickness" got her down. But as far as I knew, she hadn't experienced anything worse than mild discomfort.

Though it was still too early to tell, I thought I was beginning to see the first signs of pregnancy on her frame, when she lied curled up on the bed or the carpet with a shirt that was too tight, or no shirt at all. She'd play with her hair on such occasions – twist it or chew it – usually reading a book or a magazine. She had picked up a few parenting magazines weeks ago and said she comforted herself with the images of healthy, happy, and generally cute babies.

We hadn't picked out definite names yet. Everyday we'd come up with new ones, and I'd write them down in a notebook. We knew we still had a long time to decide.

It was barely raining outside when I dressed and headed to the kitchen for some kind of breakfast. The morning news claimed a large storm was rolling in. I'd been taking a bit of a leave from my job down at the grocery, so I figured I could go and get a few hours of work in before the storm hit. Needed to meet my quota, but I didn't like driving in the rain.

And that's when I ran into my best friend.

I told him I was going down to log in some time at the store. He asked if I was taking my car. Then he told me that she had already taken it.

"What?" was probably my initial reaction. She had her own car, after all. Why take mine? He shrugged, looking a little more sheepish than usual.

"She left this morning," he said, "She said you wouldn't mind. Something about yours having more gas."

I had just filled up last night, so that part made sense, but something still bothered me about the whole exchange. I thanked him, then I ran down to the garage. My car was missing. Her's was, sure enough, still there. She'd left the keys on the seat. She was always considerate like that.

I don't know why I decided to check –my desire to clock some time at the grocery had long vanished– but I climbed in the driver's seat and looked at the gas gauge.

There was a half tank left.

I couldn't think of anywhere she'd be going that would require more than that.

And then, to my malcontent, I could.

I flew out of that car and up the stairs to our room.

The number, the address, that shred of paper that she kept on the nightstand, that would drive me crazy if I thought about why she was keeping it so long…

It was gone.

I didn't go down to the grocery. I didn't do much of anything, except wait, up in the room. I'd stacked up all the parenting magazines and pamphlets that she had lying around, and my name notebook on that spot on the dresser, where the paper had been. 

And I stared straight at it until it looked like nothing.

She came in later. Much later. I heard the car pull up, and slowly, painfully made my way down to meet her at the door. I opened it as she was coming up the steps, key in hand. When she saw me, she slowly put it back in her pocket.

She had a weak, tearstained look to her, as if she had been crying and crying until she ran herself dry. It was raining hard, and she didn't have a hood on her jacket, let alone an umbrella.

And she stood and she looked at me. And she didn't say anything.

"Why?" I asked her, that familiar word that made my voice catch so hard.

"I couldn't," she finally says. She makes no move to come in. I make no move to let her in.

"You couldn't…" I repeat, as something begins to swell inside of me, and I don't know what it is, but it hurts, "You didn't…please…tell me you didn't, I need to hear…"

She won't tell me she didn't.

"I'm sorry," she says, as if she's at a loss, as if there's nothing else she can say, "I didn't want to. I didn't. I screamed."

"Then why?" my voice still has that catch to it. I don't know why it sounds so calm. I want to scream, I want to scream at her "YES YOU DID! YOU WANTED TO ALL ALONG!" but I don't. I just ask her why, and the rain keeps coming down.

"I…" she says, and her lips are chapped. She's a child, windblown and ready to collapse, "You're…a mutant, I'm…I couldn't…bring another mutant into the world…to be hated. Not like this."

This time I don't say anything. I still can't believe this – any of this. That she would think that. That she would do that. That she would throw that in my face.

That I'm a freak. That she's a freak. That that will always haunt me, no matter what I do.

"I love you," she says.

I shut the door in her face and run my hand down the wood until my fingers meet the deadbolt, which I twist with all my anger, frustration, hatred. I hold it there as she bangs weakly on the door, and calls my name a few times.

Then all I can hear is the rain. And I walk away.

--

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Well…you got this far. Was the lack of names a big throw off? When I started writing I didn't actually have a couple in mind. Then it sort of morphed itself into a…oh well, you know who you think it's about, and there's no real wrong answer. (My first idea involved Kurt and Amanda, and that was too cruel, so now it's two mutants instead of one =P)

Comments? Please?


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